Brigham Young's squeaky-clean image is taking a hit. There are allegations that involve consumption of alcohol — a violation of the honor code — during the weekend of Jan. 10-11, when 24 recruits were on campus.
The allegations started after hotshot linebacker Manti Te'o of Honolulu's Punahou High called Bronco Mendenhall last Saturday and said he had crossed BYU off his list.
Te'o, named the high school player of the year by the Sporting News, was among the recruits visiting Provo that weekend. Te'o, a Latter Day Saint, has three cousins at the school and BYU was once his college of choice.
But a report by former Cougar player Hans Olsen, who is a talk show host on 1280 The Zone, implicated Te'o in the incident. That sent the Cougar message boards into overdrive.
Jay Drew of the Salt Lake Tribune, who could not verify that Te'o was involved, writes: "I am fairly certain, however, that the incident involved the use of alcohol and that some current players and recruits were involved."
Things got so crazy Monday night that Mendenhall had to issue a statement:
"The matter has been handled internally by the football program in keeping with team rules and university standards. The appropriate lessons are being learned and the people involved and the program are moving forward."
Te'o has narrowed his choices to USC, UCLA and Notre Dame. Party on!
There are rumors floating around that Hans Olsen got his info on Te'o and this incident from current Utah D-Coordinator Kalani Sitake who knows Te'o and was supposedly telling Te'o all these negative things about BYU.
Sitake was a former BYU player and played with Olsen in his days at BYU. The two know each other.
Sitake was on 1280 around the time Olsen started making claims that there was zero chance BYU had at landing Te'o.
It's interesting stuff here in Cougar Town. That's for sure.
Posted by: Mitch | January 27, 2009 at 11:00 AM